It's depressing that this article is so high on HN right now. It's another example of a poor report trivializing an important debate. Meanwhile, many of the comments here are snarky and sardonic which further degrades the dialog. This is a serious subject and should be treated as such.
It's easy to shout hurray for your side. It's easy to demonize your enemy. According to the government, Snowden is a traitor. According to many frequent HN readers, the government is completely out of the control. Neither of these claims is true, but they are difficult to get past.
Although Snowden is certainly not a traitor, the accusation is serious. His life and freedom hang in the balance. Politicians and political pundits are looking for an easy solution when they demonize Snowden. Making him out to be the enemy makes it easier to keep the country calm about the issues he unveiled.
While Snowden isn't a monster, the surveillance programs are not evil either. They are shocking. They evoke emotional response. They can be frightening -- especially since we don't know how much deeper the programs go. Still, they are the largely the result of people trying to defend the country from terrorism. Regardless of the cynicism you bring to the topic, the primary goal of these programs is to save lives. Accept that, take a breath, then reevaluate your grievances.
I'm not suggesting that there's nothing to be angry or worried about. I'm certainly not saying that the programs are right or benevolent. I'm saying that this is important and meaningful and needs to be treated as such rather than another opportunity to win points in some silly political game.
I don't agree with your statement that the surveillance programs are not evil because their goal is to save lives. Essentially nobody is intentionally evil. There's a reason we say "the road to Hell is paved with good intentions", and it's not because we're all civil engineering aficionados.
Evil can and does arise from people trying to do their best to make the world a better place. To say that the program isn't evil because it's trying to save lives is incredibly dangerous.
At the risk of triggering a Godwin, let's all recall that Hitler rose to power "trying to defend the country from terrorism". We probably don't have any nascent Hitlers, but we certainly have people who will abuse power if they get it, and ignoring people with good intentions will make them impossible to detect.
That's not even entirely relevant. Others have pointed to the example of J. Edgar Hoover, which is highly relevant. Imagine not a figurehead, or an evil president, imagine merely an ambitious civil functionary who abuses and misuses his secret powers outside of any oversight.
I think people overlook this because it seems too far-fetched. But I don't think it's so outrageous that it shouldn't be considered. And whether the system is being used for these purposes or not, the fact that a system exists that could is a very dangerous situation.
Insofar as national policy is overdetermined, who the president happens to be for a given term is irrelevant. So the question becomes, is the surveillance state overdetermined? There's certainly a strong collation behind it--the money alone makes it so. I suspect the president has very little freedom in these matters.
Yet I wonder who's on the other side. Have all the major players just said, "sure, that works for me?" Surely someone powerful feels the risk.
Remember that it wasn't the Washington Post that drove Nixon's disgrace, it was the FBI using the Post as an instrument. It was government feuding, and I wonder if this latest episode is another instance of feuding. Maybe I hope it is.
Imagining is fun because it doesn't require facts or logic. Pasting Nixon on to the current situation, while mildly amusing, does not clarify what is actually occuring. It is still far from clear. Is there a solid piece of evidence that Snowden is holding back for dramatic effect? Not releasing it, if he has it, lets the story become a mockery of itself because without any facts all you are left with is your imagination.
I sometimes amuse myself by thinking about how Nixon would be far too liberal to get elected today. Of course, a Nixon coming of age in today's climate might be quite different.
This. As cliché as it may sound, John Dalberg-Acton was very very accurate when he said ""Power tends to corrupt, and absolute power corrupts absolutely."
Right now, the way this agency is being run and the way it is being handed power by the few in Congress that know all the details is as close to absolute informational power as you can have.
The difference is Nixon did this illegally while Obama cleared everything through those ridiculous secret courts. He has carte blanche to trample on the constitution all he wants
I see no difference at all. Nixon did something illegal and Obama wrote "this is legal" on a piece of paper that few people get to see. Hell, how do you know Nixon didn't scribble something in his private bathroom that said what he was doing was legal?
There's an important difference, in that Obama is using authority granted him by Congress and affirmed by the courts, whereas Nixon did his stuff independently of the other branches of government.
The consequences of this can be seen in what happened when they were found out. Nixon got drummed out of office, while Obama gets essentially a free pass. Sure, Congress is asking a few inconvenient questions, but about unimportant details.
Unchecked power corrupts anybody that uses it. Obama should have closed these secret courts that authorize drone murder and mass spying the moment he took office, now it seems he's been sucked in and corrupted just like anybody else in his position.
Its not just domestic spying either, there is a whole gov propaganda chorus on social media to influence discussion and squash dissent run by centcom. At first they "promised" it would not be used domestically but if you were to go looking around twitter and online media comments you will easily find the centcom puppets demonizing and discrediting Snowden, drowning out the issues he leaked which is criminal domestic surveillance
I'm not sure if its corruption/venality or if its the fact that he has a wife and kids that keep him from going up against those who seem to hold the true power but one way or another it's deeply disappointing.
He wouldn't really be interested in shutting down secret courts that authorize *the behavior he is interested in perusing". It wasn't Dubya who brought back assassination, it was Obama.
Just how many lives has terrorism claimed in the past decade?
Smoking has probably claimed more lives just today than terrorist attacks on US soil in the past decade. So I don't think it warrants any action at all.
Let's face it the aim of terrorism is to scare people and if we are so scared that we're giving away basic human rights (and correspondence secrecy is a basic human right) then the terrorist won.
"Decade" is a very convenient window. How about 15 years (or even 12)?
Also, smoking is an awful example because - due to the dishonesty of the cigarette industry and the real health risks - there was massive federal regulation of tobacco consumption and marketing starting in the 1970s, as well as the $200B+ Tobacco Master Settlement that came later.
There was enormous public action at the state and federal level against the tobacco industry.
EDIT: I dont' care about karma any more, but you downvoters suck. pg, mark my words that this Snowden/NSA crap will be the end of HN as a quality forum. It's unreadable lately. Every tin-foil hatter or teenage naif out there is using it as their personal forum in this pissing match of who can be more strident over something that any halfway intelligent person had assumed was happening already.
Are you joking? Do you know the cumulative cost of policing US roads, prosecuting offenders, and jailing the felonious vehicular offenders? I bet it's a lot more that 1% of the NSA budget.
Also, I'm going out on a limb and assuming you know no more than me about the probability of future terrorist threats, and the value of your opinion is equally negligible.
Almost none of the policing you mention is directed at reckless driving. The vast majority of highway policing is for excessive (but generally safe) speed, and much of the rest is enforcing bureaucratic nonsense (expired tags!). They get close with DUI enforcement, but non-drunken reckless driving goes basically ignored.
None of us can predict the future, but why would you assume terrorism wouldn't continue to be a negligible threat? Sure, it could suddenly become a leading cause of deaths in the USA, but so could kittens, in theory. If you want the government to continue to pour billions (arguably trillions if you count certain military actions on the ledger) into defending against terrorism, you'd better have an argument that goes beyond "nobody knows, but it could get bad!"
I think your metrics for concern about potential threats is a little skewed. You seem to be looking at "concern about a potential threat" has having a 1-dimensional score. Yes, there are more instances of death by hammer in the USA in a given year than there are terrorist attacks. But, the terrorist attacks have the potential for much larger impact (see links, below). Consider a 2-dimensional score for threat scenarios where we multiply likelihood of occurrence by potential impact for the following scenarios:
Scenario A:
Bludgeoned to death by a hammer.
Scenario B:
Terrorists recover a missing Cold-war era nuke, and detonate it over Iowa, during the winter. Effects are: nuclear explosion, EMP pulse disrupting power grid and electronics, disruption in home heating and food/medical supplies, downwind radioactive fallout over Chicago, Ohio, Pittsburgh, Philly, Boston, New York, Baltimore, DC, etc..
Scoring (pulling these numbers out of my arse for illustration purposes):
Scenario A: 6000 occurrences per year * 1.2 deaths per occurrence = 12000
Scenario B: 0.2 terrorist occurrences per year * (10 million fatalities + ((0.5 fatality / endangered) * 150 million endangered) = 17 million
As you can see, the terrorism is a lot more serious than hammers (or kittens). And, something like the NSA program could catch these potential large-impact events, because there are a lot of realistic and very scary scenarios:
P.S. Hello, NSA! I'm guessing this comment has gotten caught in some of your filters. I just want to say, keep up the good work. My brother-in-law works at Fort Mead, too.
And then, despite being clever enough to launch a nuclear attack, they're somehow stopped because they Skype'd each other "hey Bill, when are we launching that nuke?" That despite the financing and coordination behind a nuclear strike, they can't figure out any sort of way to communicate in a covert manner.
So, because you can't find fault with my main point that there are scary high-impact potential threats that the US government can and should try to protect us from, you are instead picking apart an imaginary scenario that I spent all of 30 seconds thinking up in order to illustrate my main point? Or, did I miss something?
No crap there are holes in Scenario B. Why don't you describe one that would be realistic since you seem to be good at looking at the details? I gave you all sorts of links about missing plagues and other bomb-making materials.
Or maybe the terrorist's just put up a sign at the launchpad that says "Acme Oil Drilling, Serving Des Moines since 1897!"
Regardless, Article 1 Section 8 of the Constitution lists one of the duties of the federal government as "repel Invasions". An invasion occurs when someone or some group enters the land as an enemy and any activity to prevent or discontinue that situation would constitute repelling.
Additionally, Article IV Section 4 says "shall protect each of them [State in the Union] against Invasion".
I know the 4th Amendment talks about being secure in your papers and effects against searches, but this NSA surveillance (from what I've read) seems to be reasonable, warranted, and used in a limited manner (given that the real economy is still in a slump and new politicians get elected to existing posts).
Please try explaining to me again how the NSA looking for potential high-impact terrorist events is not a valid and important government function.
So, because you can't find fault with my main point that there are scary high-impact potential threats that the US government can and should try to protect us from, you are instead picking apart an imaginary scenario that I spent all of 30 seconds thinking up in order to illustrate my main point? Or, did I miss something?
I think you missed the point. He's essentially pointing out the fact that you spent all of 30 seconds thinking up a ridiculous scenario and then expected everyone to take it seriously as something that supports your argument.
An invasion occurs when someone or some group enters the land as an enemy and any activity to prevent or discontinue that situation would constitute repelling.
See, that's precisely the kind of thing that makes it hard to take you seriously. You're essentially redefining words "invade" [1] and "repel" [2].
this NSA surveillance (from what I've read) seems to be reasonable, warranted, and used in a limited manner
You're trying to argue that the NSA surveillance is "warranted" by redefining words "invade" and "repel". I don't think we need to go farther than a dictionary for a counter-argument.
What @mikeash disputed, though, was your attempt to argue that the surveillance is "reasonable" by coming up with that amusing little scenario.
Basically, you argued that the surveillance is reasonable because the magnitude of the outcome of the terrorist threat is serious enough to make the surveillance reasonable, because it's supposed to diminish the probability of the terrorist threat manifesting itself in an outcome like that.
Of course, one big problem is that you tried to support your argument with the aforementioned scenario and then blew up at @mikeash for criticizing you, as if the onus of coming up with the support for your argument was on him and not on you. Another big problem is in your assumption that mass-scale NSA surveillance of everyone in the USA and the world will really drive down the probability of a terrorist threat worst-case outcome, which is a subject of a heated debate, instead of being an assumption you can just take for granted.
The bigger problem is that line of reasoning doesn't allow for any restraint whatsoever: There was nothing in the argument that wouldn't apply to stationing a police officer in your home.
Second, I mean warranted as in "has a warrant". From wikipedia (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PRISM_(surveillance_program)_ "U.S. government officials have disputed some aspects of the Guardian and Washington Post stories and have defended the program by asserting it cannot be used on domestic targets without a warrant, and that the program receives independent oversight from the executive, judicial, and legislative branches."
Third, I tried to let you people know that my scenarios were a bit factually incorrect by saying that I was "pulling the numbers out of my arse"! That some aspects of Scenario B were wrong beyond just the numbers shouldn't be surprising. Furthermore, where's the nitpicking about Scenario A then? I spent even less time thinking about it, so it should a little easier to pick apart.
I blew up at mikeash not because he was criticizing you, but because he is being blockheaded. As are you.
First, you have redefined both words. We could quibble semantic details ad nauseum, but since your written English is pretty good, I suspect your overall English is good enough that you know exactly what you're doing. Even if it wasn't, the "especially by an army" bit should have been a huge hint about the spirit of the word "invade".
Second, if you want to argue the legal points of whether the surveillance is warranted, you don't need to come up with vague, hand-wavy terrorist threat scenarios. You could just state your legal argument and let some expert out there destroy it ;)
Third, an excuse of "I know this is crap, but" is not a valid excuse. It's like saying to someone, "No offense, but you're a total idiot." Just because you said "no offense", it doesn't mean they shouldn't or can't take offense. Likewise, explicitly stating that you were "pulling the numbers out of your arse" doesn't make your scenario any less ridiculous or a better fit to support your argument in any way.
As for the nitpicking about scenario A, you're welcome to argue against it as much as you want. Again, the onus to do that is on you, so knock yourself out.
Fourth, @foobarqux hit the nail on the head with his comment about restraint. One thing is to argue that "repelling an invasion" is "warranted" by the government, another is to try to classify PRISM and other such surveillance programs as "repelling an invasion" and yet another is arguing about whether the extent of those programs is "warranted" or not. I don't know the Constitution by heart and to the letter, but I'm pretty sure that there's a lot of stuff in it that, taken to extremes, will contradict other stuff in it.
And fifth, if "being blockheaded" means not allowing bullshit arguments to pass as valid just because there's strong emotion behind them -- or because their author is throwing a temper tantrum -- then I hope my cranium gets as cubical as it can.
I bend no words. One of the experiences of colonialists was the Beaver Wars in which the Iroquois invaded and captured the territory of the Huron. The Iroquois would not constitute an army in the traditional sense because they were not uniformed and regimented - they were a force of irregulars, much like Al Qaeda is today. Suppose the Iroquois wanted to invade and recapture New York, that would be an invasion by a force other than an army that New York would need to repel.
And, do you spray insect REPELlent on yourself before you get bug bites or after? Protective measures also constitute repelling.
Also, I originally didn't want to argue the legality of the surveillance. I devised a hand-wavy scenario to illustrate my threat-assessment point.
Because, saying that kittens are as or more dangerous than terrorists IS blockheaded. If I'm wrong, I invite you to go down to your local SPCA and adopt a new pet terrorist.
If you don't want me picking holes in your "realistic" scenario, don't present it. I mean, seriously. Where do you get off in giving me an example of a supposed "realistic" scenario, then complaining when I point out its flaws? It's not my fault that your example was bad.
Not that I think this whole scenario is a credible threat, but I would say (barring an explosive anti-tamper mechanism): spend a weekend in a shed beating the shit out of it with a sledgehammer.
The core material is the important part, the rest you can reconstruct yourself.
(If there is an explosive anti-tamper mechanism, you might have some luck with those water-jet bomb disarmers.)
The core material is the important part if you are, say, Iran or North Korea. However, if you are in a cave with a box of scraps and no Tony Stark, there's a lot more to it.
Exactly how PALs work is not really well known. A lot of well-informed speculation can be found here:
The most plausible mechanism for how they work is lots of crypto, plus physical-level crypto-like mechanisms wherein detonation requires setting off the various explosives in the bomb at precise and different times, and those times are not stored in the bomb itself, but rather extracted from the PAL code.
It's possible to build simple nuclear weapons that don't require a lot of complicated steps to explode. But they're tremendously inefficient, and nobody bothers with them today. A stolen nuke will be an implosion design requiring a virtuoso performance of nanosecond-level timing to detonate properly, and those timings will not be easy to reverse engineer. Build a new weapon using the fissile material from the original bomb would likewise be a massive undertaking (only "easy" if you're Iran etc., not al Qaeda), and really would no longer qualify as a "stolen" weapon as proposed.
You think the PAL on one of the missing soviet "suitcase" nuclear devices[1] is that sophisticated?
They are booby-trapped against misuse though, so that's ok.
One such cache, identified by Vasili Mitrokhin, exploded when Swiss authorities tried to remove it from a wooded area near Bern.
I don't think civilians know enough about the current state of Soviet-era nuclear devices to be able to assess the risk very well.
Personally I'd be much more concerned about Al-Qaeda linked terrorists getting access to a Pakistani bomb. The Taliban successfully launched a raid on one of Pakistan's main naval bases[2], and NATO also admitted its concern over the Taliban's ability to target the Pakistan's nuclear installations.
Given that the Pakistan Navy noted Al-Qaeda members within its ranks it isn't difficult to imagine a scenario where they get access to the disarm-codes for any PAL-like on the bombs.
I'm not sure if this is an argument for or against domestic surveillance by the NSA, though!
Are you saying this cache near Bern blew up while containing nuclear weapons? Why haven't I heard of this before? Even with a non-nuclear explosion, such an event would make international news for a month.
Allegedly (ie, according to Wikipedia) the details are on pages 475 & 476 of a book called "The KGB in Europe" by former KGB officer Vasili Mitrokhin.
I don't know if that device was nuclear or not - I suspect not.
Edit: some details about other caches:
A former Soviet spy testified at a congressional hearing in Los Angeles on Monday that Russian intelligence operatives placed weapons and communications caches--perhaps even small nuclear devices--in California and other states as part of a plan to destabilize the United States through sabotage
> The core material is the important part if you are, say, Iran or North Korea. However, if you are in a cave with a box of scraps and no Tony Stark, there's a lot more to it.
Similarly, I suspect that PALs have traditionally been designed with the first in mind. They prevent a proper detonation as the bomb as it currently exists. They seem less concerned with someone using the bomb to cobble together a (relatively speaking) inefficient bomb, or even just a dirty bomb.
If you are satisfied with merely dozens to hundreds dead, and a massive clusterfuck of a disproportionate response, you may have to do nothing more than merely trigger the PAL's anti-tampering mechanism in a populated area. Worse case scenario there is that it doesn't work that way, then you just throw it into a truck with some fertilizer and blow it up anyway.
Nations are not interested in using a bomb like that, they would want the real deal in a form factor that is practical for military use. PALs seem designed to prevent that.
The possibility of taking an existing bomb and using it to build a new nuclear bomb without being an actual military is absurd. You'll not get an inefficient bomb, you'll get a dud.
Dirty bombs are a different threat altogether. One that's almost entirely psychological. No doubt effective at that, but a completely different scenario than the one being discussed.
Detecting terrorist nukes coming into the country is basically a side-effect of a sane defense policy against other nuclear states, and other nuclear states are quite a large threat.
You are confusing the result of the thing with the thing.
Terrorism is not a big problem because we work so hard to fight against it. You've confused that with not being a big problem in the first place. (It's like Y2K - it wasn't a big problem because we made such a big deal out of it and everything got fixed.)
And detecting a hidden nuke coming into the country is not the same thing as looking for nukes from other countries.
In one case you watch the country, in the other you watch your borders.
I'm not confusing anything. Please read what I'm saying rather than relying on your projection of what you think I think.
I'm well aware of the possibility that terrorism is rare because it's so heavily fought. I just don't see any reason to think that's actually the case.
Yes, terrorism could be like Y2K, in that it's a big problem that's averted through lots of hard work. It just doesn't look that way to me. Instead, it looks like a small problem that has tremendous resources devoted to it for no good reason.
Consider the following facts:
1. Terrorist attacks are pretty easy to carry out. Any motivated HNer could easily plan and execute an attack, on a programmer's salary, that would outshine the Boston bombings. (Something like 9/11 is obviously harder. But there's plenty of low-hanging fruit.)
2. Doing the above without getting caught is still pretty easy. There's essentially nothing in place to catch the "lone wolf".
3. Despite #1 and #2, terrorist attacks remain extremely rare.
The only conclusion I can draw from this is that there are very few people who are actually motivated to carry out attacks. It's nothing to do with enforcement, it's simply that most people don't actually want to go out and kill a bunch of innocents.
As for detecting nukes, why do you think that smuggling a warhead into the US is a technique reserved for terrorists? There's nothing that says Russia or China or North Korea couldn't do it. They probably won't, but it's enough of a threat to be worth guarding against.
You setup a strawman: "Small attacks are easy, and we don't (can't) defend against them, therefor no one wants to do small attacks."
Conclusion: Don't defend against large attacks.
But your strawman ignores that people do actually want to carry out large attacks, but they are harder to do, and get caught easier, so they happen less. That doesn't mean we should not defend against them.
(And obviously "most" people don't want to kill innocents. There are those that do however.)
> There's nothing that says Russia or China or North Korea couldn't do it. They probably won't, but it's enough of a threat to be worth guarding against.
Of course they "could". But why? It wouldn't gain them anything, so they won't bother. Like I said: For attacks by a country watch that country, not the border. i.e. look for the motivations.
(I suppose Iran might bother, if they could. But they'd probably do it by proxy, i.e. terrorist.)
I don't think that's what a "straw man" is. I didn't make up something that I claimed was your position and then attacked it.
My argument doesn't ignore these things, I simply disagree with you. I really wish we could have these discussions without people constantly telling me that I'm "ignoring" things when they find points they disagree with. I mean, I'm not an idiot. Obviously people want to carry out large attacks, as evidenced by the fact that they have.
However, the available evidence leads me to believe that people also want to carry out small attacks. The vast majority of terrorism worldwide is small attacks, and this is true no matter what the security situation in the region is. Most terrorism is individuals blowing themselves up on busses or similar, regardless of whether it's in a surveillance state or an anarchy or anything in between.
Thus, a relatively small number of small attacks implies a relatively smaller number of large attacks. The numbers are such that I don't see it being worth defending against at anything like the level we're currently doing.
As for nuclear smuggling by states, the obvious reason would be to use it as a first strike. Decapitate the enemy's command and control by detonating a warhead in their capital with no advance warning, then clean up the rest.
Yes, they probably don't want to carry out a first strike. But part of that lack of desire comes from our deterrence, and part of that deterrence comes from being able to carry out a retaliatory strike, and part of that comes from having advance warning of the initial strike.
>Terrorism is not a big problem because we work so hard to fight against it.
Citation needed. The government has yet to stop a single terrorist plot. The only ones they claim they've stopped are very clear entrapment cases that never would have amounted to anything without the government supplying the motivations and the supplies.
Every time a terrorist has actually tried an attack they've either succeed or screwed up all by themselves. The reason terrorism is not a big problem for the US is because terrorists nearly never attack the US.
> The government has yet to stop a single terrorist plot.
The world isn't an action movie where the hero stops the terrorist by cutting the wire on the bomb at the last minute.
An attack is stopped way way earlier in the process, where there is much less drama.
It gives a perverse incentive actually: Wait till the attack gets really big and obvious before stopping it, just so you can get some good press. I hope they never give in to this.
We have no evidence that even one plot has been stopped. The plots they show us that they have stopped are clear cases of entrapment. So why would you assume that some great work is going on behind the scenes given these two bits of evidence?
But it's amusing you bring up action movies since you clearly believe them. The reason we're not constantly getting attacked is because no one is attacking us.
Oh, you completely missed the numbers on the effects of conversion of the US of A into a police state. It was a good move on your part, since democracy and freedom are such an important part of American culture that the loss is not quantifiable.
It was Thomas Jefferson who said something along the lines of "The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of tyrants and patriots". Americans are, today, scared so shitless by Bin Laden that they prefer surrendering freedom instead of committing some blood to the cause of freedom.
Pre 9/11 this NSA case would be a second Watergate. Today, it's yesterday's news. Bin Laden, for all intents and purposes, won.
I see your questionably attribute Jefferson quote and raise you a whole Constitutional Convention, which wrote in the US Constitution, Article IV Section 4, "[The federal goverment] shall protect each of them [State in the Union] against Invasion".
Speaking from Europe, you don't know invasion. Invasion is not a bomb in a marathon, and it isn't an attack on a skyscraper. You have never seen invasion, and realistically it's not a danger to the US.
Invasion is certainly not such a risk that widespread privacy invasion is warranted.
You are scared. You should also get some of the "brave" out of your lore and into reality.
Speaking from America, you sound like a pretentious stuffed shirt.
Through the miracle of broadcast media, like the printing press or YouTube, it is wholly unnecessary to experience an invasion to know that it is something worth repelling.
Besides, we American have experience with repelling invasions both large and small and from regular military and irregular forces, just not in recent years. Try searching on these topics: American Indian Wars, French and Indian War, War of 1812, Aroostook War, the Texas War of Independence, the Battle of Gettysburg, Sherman's March to the Sea, and the Aleutian Islands Campaign.
Lately, we Americans have been doing a good job of keeping the fighting over there instead of over here, and I imagine PRISM has been a big contributor to that success.
You imagine that without PRISM, we'd be fighting or at least have fought a war on American territory in recent years? Who would be the supposed aggressor?
The NSA couldn't even catch some college kids in Boston when the Russians phoned it in to Homeland Security 3 months earlier...
Also, if this is an effective mechanism like search warrants why couldn't it go through normal channels? Why do we need secret courts? If it's legit just tell the nation they're being wiretapped and we can have that discussion. Not being able to have a discussion publicly about how the government surveils us is contrary to the very essence of democracy.
If the people cannot consent then the governance is illegitimate according to the rule of law in the US. If wiretapping the nation is a good idea take it to the voters.
Detonating a nuke high enough to get widespread EMP damage is probably going to mean little or no fallout, especially with the kinds of devices that were used by both side later in the the Cold War (i.e. very efficient compact designs intended to allow as many RVs in a MIRV warhead as possible).
To really get a decent EMP, you need to detonate the weapon at an altitude of several hundred kilometers. Any fallout will just be added to the already massive amount of fission products in the atmosphere from previous detonations.
There is good money in traffic enforcement. So good that in Texas we had to make it against the law to finance your whole police department with speed-trap revenue.
The way to predict the future is look at the past. If we start at the first WTC bombing until today there are around 100 terrorism deaths per year. Utterly irrelevant.
You seem to imply we should trust the government to tell us the probability but they've never been right in the past and are completely opaque in their methods. There's literally no reason to believe them at all.
Okay, sure, let's toss out the comparison to smoking. How about deaths in motor vehicles on the US highways? Okay, not that either – there's been (arguably) a lot spent on that in the last 15 years. How about choking to death or babies dying from SIDS? A quick google shows that each claims about 2,500 lives a year in the US. So, over the last 15 years, that's approximately 37,500 lives lost to each, or 75,000 total over the last 15 years... I'll leave the terrorism death count to you. And, I guarantee you, the funding isn't anywhere near the anti-terrorism funding.
Like lupatus mentioned in the other response, there is considerable variability in the risk from terrorism. I would guess - while tragic, and my profound sympathies to anyone reading this who has been touched by either - that SIDS and infant/toddler choking deaths are much more consistent year over year (and there is a lot of educational material out there on preventing SIDS with sleep positions, and huge federal regulation on childrens' toys for, eg BuckyBalls).
I would instead use the analogy of weather in the context of urban planning around floodplains, building standards, etc. These are typically based on 50 or 100 year storm events. If you look at a 15 year average, these standards look like overkill.
EDIT: Lo and behold, another downvote. What in the way I've structured my argument or my logic is flawed? Or is it just more satisfying to downvote those you disagree with? Anyway, downvote away, you're only lowering yourself. I don't care.
The risk from terrorism is, most greatly, the fear of terrorism and the effort a society will expend on trying to stop future terrorism, which in itself generates fear and adds to the likelihood of spending more on preventing terrorism...
In short, it's all too easy to let it become a vicious cycle that simply is not justified based on the actual damage done by terrorism.
To circle back to your analogy to floods – I'm not sure about what you're suggesting. Are you saying we need to look at a larger timeframe? If so, I would point out that I was considering precisely the timeframe you suggested. But, beyond that, looking over the last 100 years, SIDS and choking have certainly killed more... and I would expect they'd continue to do so over the next 100, even if the current anti-terrorism measures were never enacted.
> Like lupatus mentioned in the other response, there is considerable variability in the risk from terrorism.
"Considerable variability" doesn't begin to cut it. Deaths from terror attacks follow a power law. That's why it doesn't make sense to compare them to fundamentally linear phenomena like traffic or smoking deaths. Coincidentally (or not), flood levels also follow a power law.
The thing about a power law phenomenon is that you can use it to justify an arbitrarily high prevention spend, because given the sample you have, you can guarantee an event lying outside it. Repeat ad infinitum.
How about lifetimes worth of wasted hours due to security theater? I would bet that those are substantially greater than the number of lifeyears lost to terrorist attacks.
Don't fret too much about the down votes. I once got voted down to something like -182 karma for giving supported arguments that a gay illegal immigrant journalist should be deported.
After that, pg stopped showing karma scores in the comments.
You're missing the first rule of any bureaucracy like the NSA, it has nothing to do with catching terrorists, but far more to do with perpetuating the bureaucracy and increasing it's budget. Catching anyone is a distant second.
I actually agree with this argument. I do believe terrorism shouldn't be ignored, but terrorism isn't about killing. it's about terror. we are terrified of terrorists and anything that resembles them. therefore: the terrorists have already won. when we give up our basic civil rights to protect ourselves from them, that's terror. I'm honestly more threatened by my government than terrorists. Terrorists have one thing they can do, kill. They know it will probably cause their death and the death of their citizens. The government can torture you, ruin your life in many ways, and still kill you, and there seems to be no repercussions. Look at the NSA guy that lied on live television under oath, and got caught on it two weeks later. where's the purjery? I fear MY government... that's messed up
I cringe at the idea of traveling nowadays because of all the drama at the security checkpoints. Taking off hoodie, shoes, keys, laptop.. Its painful enough to remember to put them on once, that I need to do it again at the airport with a long line behind me.
Just how many lives has terrorism claimed in the past decade?
It's easy to answer that question now. No one knew the answer to that a decade ago. No one knows how many lives terrorism will claim in the next decade. The government does have to plan for the worst case scenario.
Replace "terrorism" with "killer robots" or "sharks" or "bedbugs". Your statement remains as valid as ever, but somehow the government is only spending billions (or trillions) on one of them. Why?
The NSA does a lot more than just fight terrorism and of course the US invests a huge amount of money in mitigating the impact of other risks like natural disasters. They have to look at all these different threats and divvy up the money accordingly.
Sure, but there's a point where the government could go too far. For example, if the government starting having random mattress inspections inside peoples homes that would be way too intrusive despite any reductions in bedbugs that might result.
This is so intentionally obtuse that I'm not sure what to say. Let me know when bedbugs conspire with sharks to fly a plane into a building.
I think a great case can be made for the NSA and other agencies spending too much money "fighting terrorism," but there's no reason to hurt that argument with such an absurd stance.
"No one knows how many lives bedbugs will claim in the next decade. The government does have to plan for the worst case scenario."
The above is nuts, right? Yet both bedbugs and terrorists account for a negligible number of American deaths historically. So the above can't be nuts if the equivalent statement about terrorism is non-nuts.
Please explain where I'm wrong, and don't just say I'm "intentionally obtuse".
The United States has experienced large scale terrorist acts(9/11) and has stopped other terrorist plots since then. Terrorism has claimed significantly more lives than bedbugs, and has also cause tremendous damage to United States infrastructure. I'd also argue that comparing the deaths of folks involved in 9/11 to the deaths that have(n't) been experienced by bedbugs to be both absurd and disrespectful, but that's beside the point.
It's hard for me to believe that you're actually trying to make this argument.
To several significant figures, American deaths from both terrorism and bedbugs are 0% of total American deaths.
Tremendous damage to United States infrastructure? What are you talking about? Those buildings damaged and destroyed in downtown Manhattan? Yes, billions of dollars in damage, but way down in the noise in the economy overall. Congress causes more financial damage in a night of gridlock than that.
It's hard for you to believe? Well, believe it. I am making the argument. We react far too hard to terrorism, by several orders of magnitude. It's basically an allergic reaction. The story of terrorism and the US over the past decade and change is pretty much the story of a bee and a person with a bee allergy. Essentially all of the damage is done by the massive overreaction to the sting, not the by the bee. The difference is that we can, at least in theory, simply choose to stop being allergic. The problem won't be solved by overreacting even more.
>and has stopped other terrorist plots since then.
No it hasn't, not a single one. Every single case they've "stopped" was simple entrapment of mentally unstable people. If they'd left those people alone nothing would have ever happened.
> The government does have to plan for the worst case scenario.
No more so than the government needs to consider all other scenarios, and the costs of any policy choice in those scenarios, and use the likelihood along with the potential costs and benefits of each scenario in assessing the desirability of the policy.
Otherwise, planning for the worst case scenario just becomes a convenient excuse for policies that make life considerably worse for everyone in the most likely scenario.
That doesn't make much sense. What's the objective? If it IS saving lives, then a lot less money than the NSA burns up can be spent saving a lot more drug addicts, cancer sufferers, typhoid, HIV, and so on - there are millions more deaths than those caused by terrorism - no matter how unquantifiable those are.
Deaths from terror attacks follow a power law distribution. There is literally no such thing as a worst-case scenario. For any "justifiable" spend or effort on preventing attacks, you can guarantee that there will be an attack coming along which will justify spending more.
The comparison to automobiles is interesting because this is another example where we do sacrifice freedoms to enhance safety. At the state level we have licenses, registrations, speed limits, mandatory seat belt laws, insurance mandates, etc. At the federal level we have safety standards. Not sure it's terribly relevant just an interesting parallel.
It's especially interesting because a lot of automobile safety revolves around mitigating damage once an incident occurs, and there's a fairly concrete number (IIRC around $3 million) for how much money it's worth spending to save one additional life. Neither one would be considered even remotely acceptable in counterterrorism.
It's not about the number of lives but it is about the state of fear that grips the state afterwards. That anything can happen and government has no power to stop that.
I spent a decade in South Africa where the ANC bombed the shit out of it, and there was concern, not terror. No one I encountered was afraid, let alone terrified. Each death was a tragedy, but like the IRA terror bombings in London, people just carry on with their lives.
This is the funniest thing about the US. Some places experience actual terrorism and they don't let it control their lives. The US has one successful attack of 3k people (to be fair, that's pretty big for a terrorist attack) one time and go literally insane.
Imagine what the world would be like today if the US government had somehow managed to take this approach in 2001. (I say "somehow" because even if Bush and everyone around him wanted to do it this way, people were calling for blood.)
Here's what I see:
1. Al Qaeda remains a global nuisance but ignorable.
2. The governments of Iraq and Afghanistan remain more or less like they were. The population of those countries is probably differently off than they are in reality, but not necessarily better or worse.
3. The US federal debt is several trillion dollars lower.
4. The US economy is doing better.
5. No PATRIOT act, nobody rotting away in Guantanamo, somewhat less ubiquitous surveillance.
All in all, sounds like a big win. Do you disagree?
It took me a while to parse your sentence, and to figure out who the "they" was referring to. In turns out that in English and in many Middle Eastern languages, "Afghani" is the singular form of the demonym of Afghanistan. This mirrors the singular demonym of many other Middle Eastern countries (e.g., "an Israeli, "Yemeni", "Iraqi"). So "the Afghani" refers to a single person from Afghanistan. It took me a second reading to figure out that you meant the people of Afghanistan, in plural.
The commonly accepted plural form in English is "Afghans" [1].
Eisenhower certainly didn't think so, and he lived through the main example people bring up to support it:
"Every gun that is made, every warship launched, every rocket fired signifies, in the final sense, a theft from those who hunger and are not fed, those who are cold and are not clothed."
That implies that the people who push and pay for guns and rockets would ever allocate that money to food or clothes, if it wasn't spent for the former.
As far as resourcing goes food and clothing is as easy a problem to solve as the U.S. will ever encounter; it is the will to solve it that is necessary.
If it was happening every day it might be worth considering. But a one-off of 10k wouldn't be worth my time either. The proper response to 9/11 was what Norway showed us: "this is terrible and we're going to grieve but we're not going to change anything".
especially since we don't know how much deeper the programs go. Still, they are the largely the result of people trying to defend the country from terrorism
So you don't know how deep it goes, but already decided what you would find at the other end of it if you did. Okay?
Regardless of the cynicism you bring to the topic, the primary goal of these programs is to save lives.
Regardless of the optimism you bring to the topic, a lot of the same people who are for these programs, are also for wars that get a whole lot of people killed for nothing but dominance. So, hmmm.
Oh, and did it ever occur to you that for some people learning about the world comes first, then cynicism about certain issues second, not the other way around as is often so conveniently implied?
I'm certainly not saying that the programs are right or benevolent.
That is exactly what you just did -- "the primary goal of these programs is to save lives".
I'm afraid you've misunderstood on several levels. My language was careful, your reading was not.
First, my post gives no judgement on Prism or other program positive or negative. I have not "decided what [I will] find at the other end..." I am critical of the programs, but I choose not to take the easy way out by demonizing the NSA or portraying these programs as an Orwellian nightmare.
Second, I point out the "primary" goal is to save lives, but I make no mention of additional goals or side effects. These goals and side effects are part of the larger discussion that can only be productive when we take a deep breath and set aside our preconceived notions of the programs. This is as difficult to me as it is to anyone. My initial reaction to the news of these programs was visceral. I was angry and frustrated. Now my frustration has been rechanneled to the sadly fruitless discussion. In short, there are effects outside the primary goal (of saving lives) that are bad and should be criticized. If you can criticize the bad without losing sight of the good, you can find progress.
I won't respond to what is "often so conveniently implied" since I never implied any such thing.
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but I choose not to take the easy way out by demonizing the NSA or portraying these programs as an Orwellian nightmare.
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Fair enough, but then why take the easy way out of the discussion, and instead of addressing individual posts guilty of the above in your opinion directly, but just fire that salvo into the room? Okay, you're free to do that, to summarize and save yourself time, but at least know that I read a lot of ("you're all wrong because of strawman strawman") in the last weeks on HN, and reacted more polemic to your post than maybe was called for. Apologies for that.
But still, I disagree. "Orwellian" to me is about language and the resulting inability to reason, not telescreens and 5 minutes of hate.
We live on a planet were Saddam was attacked in the windfall of 9/11, while huge chunk of the American people believed he had something to do with it. It's not like administration said "hey, we need this war, but we don't want you to support it for false reasons, Saddam was NOT involved in 9/11, he's just this super epic dictator and weapons wiz". That would still have been bullshit deserving of a hanging "if the Nuremberg laws were applied", but it would have been a nice gesture.
But no. They used it passively. Result of the whole exercise, so far that is? More dead people than the whole history of terrorism against the US several times over. While talking about democracy, posing on an aircraft carrier, all that stuff.
Not that I can blame the NSA for that, I don't. But there is no Orwellian institution in an otherwise sane society, it's all connected. The NSA is just one aspect of it, not even a very interesting one IMHO. But hey, you do recall "Total Information Awareness", and how they scrambled to change the name when they realized they were too honest, right? So the NSA certainly does Orwellian in-house, too. But even when they don't, they are a tool in the toolbox of an Orwellian state. The only way to deny that would be to say they are actually independant of it, which would be a problem also. So there you go..
Even when I say NSA, I don't mean to exclude anyone else. In Germany the Verfassungsschutz (literally "constitution protection") is basically the sole reason the NPD (neonazi party) can't be dealt with, because it and the neonazi scene is so filled with undercover operatives. That got so bad that the cops in Sachsen-Anhalt, to be able to raid them without forewarning, decided to not inform the Verfassungsschutz anymore ( German, but at least it's source: http://www.taz.de/!103340/ ). I don't know if it's strictly Orwellian, but it's fucking crazy, and fucking evil. Well-meant, banal evil; the kind that actually really matters, the big killer. Suicide bombers and killing sprees are horrible, flying planes into a building I still haven't fully wrapped my head around -- but all that still vanishes compared to the killings committed in total by perfectly calm, perfectly well-meaning people, operating strictly within the law.
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Second, I point out the "primary" goal is to save lives,
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Which in turn implies benevolence. Instead of how centers of power act, in self-interest. How many people are killed by international terrorism -- I mean the kind the NSA idly watches because it's the US doing it? And how many such deaths does the NSA credibly avert? Finally, how many people could be clothed, fed and sheltered by 1% the budget of the NSA? I mean, if saving lifes is really the "primary" (why in quotes?) goal, why not at least A/B test a little?
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If you can criticize the bad without losing sight of the good, you can find progress.
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Yes, but I also find backlashes to progress. Consider the 60s and the backlash to that. I see that were people were robbed and killed in the past, they're now simply left behind in the ever faster growing gap between the super rich and the rest. I see much energy with those who fear and are greedy, and much aimlessness or premature celebration of those who love. I see the threshold for how many people you need to fool or blackmail or have on your side for complete, endless control sink rapidly as technology progresses, too.
But still, I didn't loose sight of the good. I make sure to look at clouds and smile at dogs every day. I've met nice cops, I've seen brutal ones, I know bureaucrats who are just a little slow, but friendly, and those who harbour resentment towards anyone not as bald or fat as they. And especially that I would say quite a bunch of those, and soldiers too, have... serious issues... makes me feel for those who are their fellows who are decent people.
So I wouldn't want to throw the baby out with the bathwater, and even if none of my post is about "the good stuff", and disagrees with you on many points, you can believe me that I hear you on this, and agree. Sometimes I say it myself, but sometimes I don't think it's helpful. Imagine there is a burning house, we need help putting out the fire, and some guy says "but consider all those houses that are NOT burning". Even if it's well meant it can be irritating.
I don't believe in collective punishment or blame, but I DO believe in those who are not meant getting out of the way instead of shielding those I'm trying to get at, or are being used by third parties as a shield even. I mean, if they can live with collateral damage meaning people being murdered utterly dead, they can live with me mistakenly considering someone a mediocre cog in a crappy machine, one would think.
Not even anyone I consider a "perpetrator" I really wish evil on, I don't care for punishment as much as about self-defense. But you can't forgive the attacker until you stopped the attack, because that would be just bending over. So ideally, quite a bunch of people really ought to be lead right up to the guillotine and then forgiven. I see no other way that is not a farce and pissing on graves.
But when it comes to "just" words: human history might go on for a looong time, and anyone who could take offense, no matter how bad they feel about it, will be long dead when the principles of power and rationalization will still be the same. Just read the old testament, this stuff is old as dirt. As long as there is recorded history, the world has been Orwellian as far as I can tell. I'm not so naive to think I will see the end of it, but I'll throw my weight into the scale regardless. I'm calling it, and screw anyone who doesn't like it because it applies to their little parcel of the world as well.
I'm sorry if my post is so long and incoherent, and also if it seems unfriendly or is full of typos, but I've been awake for a full 29 hours, and I'm beginning to feel it. Maybe I should have posted tomorrow but here goes. Don't take it to personally where I do you wrong, I don't know you.
First, my post gives no judgement on Prism or other program positive or negative.
Yes, it does. You said, "...the surveillance programs are not evil either." Also, you said "...the primary goal of these programs is to save lives." - which does indicate a judgement since "saving lives" is empirically a good thing...even though you really don't know the true purpose, only what you've been told.
Second, I point out the "primary" goal is to save lives, but I make no mention of additional goals or side effects
You don't know that. You have been told that, but you don't know it.
...what is "often so conveniently implied" since I never implied any such thing.
Yes, you did. You said (apparently speaking to the entire forum) that, "Regardless of the cynicism you bring to the topic, the primary goal of these programs is to save lives." - as if that nugget of "knowledge" about the alleged purpose of those programs should override any cynicism...implying that the general cynicism here is not already grounded in knowledge.
Actions speak louder than words. That's why nobody believes these pigs. It's not like they all woke up one day and said, "I should be cynical about this government thing."
>While Snowden isn't a monster, the surveillance programs are not evil either.
"Evil" is a BS religious term.
It obscures political issues.
Those programs are: far-reaching, constitution breaking, targeted as dissidents, useless for real terrorists, and, in a word unacceptable in a proper democracy.
Nobody cares if they those doing it are "evil" or not.
I also take offence with "Regardless of the cynicism you bring to the topic, the primary goal of these programs is to save lives.".
Surveillance programs have been with us long before terrorism -- they have been traditionally been deployed, along with secret services, state police, etc, against dissident citizens -- and they have a long history in the US and in all Western countries (and, it goes without saying, in all third world dictatorships).
So that their "primary goal is to save lives" needs a ton of citations. Why? Because some politicians say so? They might even believe it -- though politicians are seldom as naive, except while they are not in office. That doesn't make it true.
Any huge bureaucracy such as a government, that supports trillions of dollars in private interests, finds a way to perpetuate itself and squash those that want change to the status quo and "make waves". People don't have to be "evil" -- they just have to do their work and show some zeal. Real "evil" is banal and ordinary, not like in the movies.
According to many frequent HN readers, the government is completely out of the control. Neither of these claims is true, but they are difficult to get past.
This is simply an opinion. Over these past few weeks I have had cycles of getting angry, then pensive, and then taking a break from thinking about these issues for a while. I have just woken up, and I am feeling calm and peaceful right now. Yet, I still feel extremely strongly that these programs are immensely out of control and offensive to the ideals this country supposedly stands for, regardless of any "noble" intentions behind them.
I agree. In fact, I wish that HN users wouldn't post links to Vice at all. The quality of research and reporting is generally poor, and the tone is sensational.
Plus, the reporters' motives are questionable because Vice is a strange hybrid between a news outlet and an ad agency. Its executives have publicly acknowledge this. [1]
Whenever I point this out, someone always says, "Well, yeah, but all news is messed up." As a former investigative journalist, I find this to be a stupid argument. Americans have an incredible number of news sources to choose from. There are plenty of independent outlets with greater journalistic integrity; those who feel that all news is on par with Vice need to realize their options.
"Still, they are the largely the result of people trying to defend the country from terrorism.".
Hahaha. You made a funny.
On a serious note, do you have anything to back that statement up besides your own opinion?
The primary goal of these programs and of the government is to control a population. If they die its not so much too control, but rest assured these agencies have no qualm of taking or ruining a life or 100 000 lives to further their own interests.
I think you're mostly on the point, but unless you have serious inside knowledge, I don't know if you can really assume PRISM is about national security and not about other nefarious purposes.
"According to the government, Snowden is a traitor. According to many frequent HN readers, the government is completely out of the control. Neither of these claims is true..."
Ummm, I'm not sure if you are an American, or not, but those of us who believe in the US Constitution, as well as its Bill of Rights, know that the words contained therein are the only thing stopping our government from becoming another East Germany/North Korea style police state.
The 4th Amendment to the Constitution of the United States of America plainly lays out the right of the people to be secure in their persons, papers, and effects (the communications media of the era,) and it also spells out the requirements which the government must meet in order to breach that right to privacy. The current domestic surveillance program fails to meet these requirements on many levels.
Perhaps you don't find the abrogation of our Bill of Rights to be evidence of a government gone "completely out of the control." but a vast number of "We the People" are outraged at a great many of the acts being done in our name, without our consent.
The terrorism excuse is flimsy at best, especially in light of the fact that exponentially fewer Americans are harmed by terrorist acts than are killed by drunk driving on an annual basis.
Prescription drugs kill more Americans each year than all of the terrorist acts in the last 10 years combined.
It seems that those who would choose to marginalize the fact that our government has overstepped its mandate would rather shun the intent of the very Bill of Rights which made America the beacon of freedom and liberty for all.
History has a way of repeating itself, and those who forget the past are doomed to repeat it.
This "silly little game" is neither silly, nor little, this issue deals with an attack upon our Bill of Rights, which so many have fought and died for.
You've quoted me egregiously out of context. "silly little game" (not even verbatim) came from this sentence:
>I'm saying that this is important and meaningful and needs to be treated as such rather than another opportunity to win points in some silly political game.
You left out the "important and meaningful" part and the "treated as such" part. What I refer to as a silly game is the attempt to wrack up points for one side or the other rather than taking the debate seriously and analyzing it in a sober manner.
As I've said before. I'm very critical of these programs. But rather than contorting my mind through anger into assuming the NSA is the Third Reich, I try to take a step back.
To your point on the 4th Amendment. I agree that there is probably a violation there. I hope that there will come a time when the conversation about these programs is honest and sober enough to analyze these programs with the appropriate care.
Like several others, you've mistaken my reluctance to jump on your angry bandwagon as opposition. Far from it. At a gut level, I agree with most everything you've said here. Still, it's harmful to the public debate because it is hasty and hyperbolic.
My apologies for taking words out of context (I swear you must have edited) but this imagined attempt of mine to allegedly "wrack up points" is actually an attempt on my part to not let this issue die while the heart of the matter remains.
There is no question that the wholesale eavesdropping by the government and its agents upon innocent Americans is an "egregious" violation of the 4th Amendment.
Spying on Americans was no good when Hoover did it, it was no good when Nixon did it, and it is still no good today.
To add insult to injury our non-elected bureaucrats have repeatedly lied to us regarding the spying because they know that what they are doing is wrong.
I cannot sit idly by when my nation has delved into being a police state worthy of the term "Orwellian."
There is nothing "hasty and hyperbolic" about calling a spade a spade.
How in the world is the government not "completely out of control"? At this point basic decisions that violate the constitution are made almost daily. Hell, today we decided that the right to vote wasn't important the week after the government confirmed it is unconstitutionally spying on its citizens. What would you need for out of control? Them to be randomly shooting citizens? The idea that we should accept unconstitutional surveillance because the government's stated reason is that this "saves lives" (it doesn't) is just absolutely shocking and quite frankly, seems quite stupid.
they actually doing it already. There are only a couple of minor details for now, like it is off American soil and supposedly only for ones whom government designated as terrorists. Though i don't see how public would seriously object to shooting terrorists on American soil as well, and with government having complete unchecked power over terrorist designation ... Already, people protesting animal farms are terrorists according to the current laws like AETA in MA.
> While Snowden isn't a monster, the surveillance programs are not evil either.
I am tired of exceptionalism being thrown around. Had this been Pol Pot or Stalin few would be saying "oh they just tried to build a better society there were not evil, they purged the enemies of the people that would have prevented the utopia to take hold".
Even the most depraved dictators and butches had justifications for their crimes and reasons why they were not evil. And most importantly they had supporters that were brainwashed enough to keep defending it.
So here we also argue, of course our countrymen, elected officials, and heads of department and CEOs of large military industrial conglomerates are not "evil" they just want to save us from the terrorism. Because we are _special_. We are inherently good (unlike those other inherently _evil_ countries). We are a "city on a hill" a "shining example" etc etc. This is not a systemic problem just a small faux pas...
Just because there may not be one single person to blame for everything doesn't mean evil isn't happening. Just because it is spread and washed over in a big sea of bureaucracy were every cog does one small task (and compartmentalization in the intelligence apparatus amplifies this), doesn't mean that things are just a little out of hand. They are way out of hand.
> Still, they are the largely the result of people trying to defend the country from terrorism.
I can't think of too many instances of what we know consider evil regimes that didn't justify their actions in exactly the same way "we are just trying to defend our country from terror of <insert bogeyman here>".
> Accept that, take a breath, then reevaluate your grievances. ... I'm certainly not saying that the programs are right or benevolent.
So what are you saying? I don't understand. What I am saying is that these programs are evil. This has been going on for too long. There is too much invasion of privacy. There is too much corruption. Too much lobbying and spending on wars and military. Now is the time to get angry. Now is the time to protest.
A few whistle blowers came before Snowden. Everyone had time to take breaths while they were ignored. Ok, ignore this one. Slide further downhill.
Yes, it is easy to defend you side because, that is politics. The majority defend their interest. and if there's enough segmentation, there may even be a close to fair compromise.
Only problem now is that it's not about majority, but accumulated power. Those policies were never to defend the country (and by believing that you make me question my judgment to even start to argue with you). They are there for specific interests.
A semi-smart terrorist could get in a Battlefield 3 server and talk about blowing stuff up with his terror buddies and no one would think anything of it. Context is Key, do you think the NSA monitors all game servers worldwide? No? hmm.. Well then who are they really trying to spy on?
> It's depressing that this article is so high on HN right now
Not to pick an ad hominem - but if you've only been a HN member fro 4 days, it seems strange you'd be "depressed" that a certain story grabs the various members of this forum's interest.
> Still, they are the largely the result of people trying to defend the country from terrorism.
By reading everyone in the world's mail? No way. I don't believe that. It's an attempt at classifying people by their social impact and political orientation in order to manipulate them in elections and send police to harass the political enemies of whoever uses the database.
It's a grab for power. Information is power. They don't care about terrorism. It's not terrorism. It's more probable to die shot by a policeman than a terrorist. It's easier to die slipping in the bathroom, for pete's sake!
Thank you for posting this. I haven't been here all that long, and it has (honestly) been scaring me how extreme and often simplistic the political views of the intelligent and relatively (or quite) powerful people here seem to be.
What scares me is how far the US has fallen, how little regard the have for privacy and even human rights (e.g. Gitmo, Pakistan, etc.) but people like you still take offense that someone might imagine that the government might be out of control. Of course they're fucking out of control, get your head out of your goddamn ass.
It's easy to shout hurray for your side. It's easy to demonize your enemy. According to the government, Snowden is a traitor. According to many frequent HN readers, the government is completely out of the control. Neither of these claims is true, but they are difficult to get past.
Although Snowden is certainly not a traitor, the accusation is serious. His life and freedom hang in the balance. Politicians and political pundits are looking for an easy solution when they demonize Snowden. Making him out to be the enemy makes it easier to keep the country calm about the issues he unveiled.
While Snowden isn't a monster, the surveillance programs are not evil either. They are shocking. They evoke emotional response. They can be frightening -- especially since we don't know how much deeper the programs go. Still, they are the largely the result of people trying to defend the country from terrorism. Regardless of the cynicism you bring to the topic, the primary goal of these programs is to save lives. Accept that, take a breath, then reevaluate your grievances.
I'm not suggesting that there's nothing to be angry or worried about. I'm certainly not saying that the programs are right or benevolent. I'm saying that this is important and meaningful and needs to be treated as such rather than another opportunity to win points in some silly political game.